Hi guys,
There’s been some good responses to this question but no one seems to have a complete grip on the phenomenon. This is a subject I know a lot about as I work in online marketing but don’t get involved with these kind of ads because, as I shall explain, they are basically an organised criminal enterprise.
The reason for the use of the same copy everywhere is quite simply because it works. Banner ads are usually sold on a pricing method called Cost Per Mille or CPM for short. This means that I pay you say $3 for a thousand impressions of my ad on your site. An impression is just the image loading one time. As such all the risk in this relationship is on me, I need to make damn sure that people click on that ad! On Google you pay for the click itself, so if the ad isn’t compelling and people don’t click then at least I haven’t lost any money (but I also haven’t got any clicks either).
Why does this kind of copy work? It appeals to a very broad range of people using various psychological triggers:
- Everyman - if a single mom did it surely I can too
- Local - Wow, this mom lived near me?
- Intrigue - What is this weird old trick?
- Anti elitism/intellectualism - Damn dentists trying to keep this secret!
Generally speaking you’ll find that if you click on the ad it will take you to what looks like a blog about someone’s experiences. Alternatively it may lead to what seems to be a news article. In both cases the blog and the article are fake (and are known in the trade as a flog and farticle respectively). The blog will expand on the triggers that I listed above in the ad.
As alluded to above these techniques are used to ‘sell’ a variety of products:
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Weight loss/muscle gain stuff - acai berries, cho yung tea, whatever
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Get rich quick schemes
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Teeth whitening
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Penis enlargement
And so on. Basically anything that is a big sore point emotionally for people is a good target for these kind of ads.
Generally speaking the products will not work as advised and in many cases will be outright useless. Acai berries for instance are a reasonable source of anti oxidants but they will not get you RIPPED IN 10 DAYS as the landing pages will lie to you about. Nor are there pills that will make your dig bigger (other than viagra).
But it gets worse…
The reason that these ads are SO prolific nowadays and you do see them everywhere now, not just on shady torrent sites and the like, is that the return they make for the people who place them is huge, as such they can afford to pay a LOT for their traffic and this means even respectable sites like the Straight Dope end up carrying them.
Generally speaking the ads are run by ‘affiliates’. These are third parties who advertise for the supplier in return for a commission on successful ‘sales’. This is a business model that can be used legitimately despite what you may think and is done so by most online traders but it can also be associated with shady stuff like this.
If you click on one of these ads the landing page will try and get you to sign up for a ‘free’ trial, you just pay for P&P. Hidden in the small print is that they will actually bill you every month for X dollars. Also, in many cases you’ll find it next to impossible to cancel and you may simply get money randomly taken from your credit card at their chosing. A lot of the companies running this are incorporated in dodgy areas where not much can be done to them. So they get to sell you a very cheap product, for a very very expensive price without you realising until it’s too late in many cases.
So to summarise:
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The same copy is used frequently because it works well in generating clicks to the landing pages
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The product can vary widely but the basic business model is the same and it’s a rip off
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Don’t click these ads! Don’t sign up for the free trial!
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Your dick’s fine just the way it is champ.
**
